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I am a Democrat who has spent the last two years often criticizing my own party and fellow Democrats.

Yeah, I’m a bad Democrat, I know.

Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton

Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton

The Tennessean

I have friends and readers asking me, “Are you still a liberal?” and “Have you changed parties?” and “Why are you seemingly defending Trump?”

To many of my long-time progressive readers, I’ve suddenly become an elephant in donkey’s clothing.

Which party I align with is, of course, of no consequence to anyone, except that because I regular opine on this page, my readers deserve to know where I’m coming from, politically speaking.

I’ve been a loyal Democrat for about 15 years. As someone who became a citizen in 2006, I became a Democrat during the George W. Bush years, because I liked the party’s anti-war, pro-minority, pro-environment, pro-little guy positions.

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But the 2016 election was an eye-opener for me. To use the current political jargon, I became “woke,” in some very different ways, and I got “red-pilled.”

It was the year I recognized that our two political parties have become dinosaurs, ossified beyond recognition. Yes, there’s grassroots energy in the Democratic party, but party leadership is essentially bereft of ideas.

It was the year I joined millions of Americans in losing faith in the ruling class of both parties and in many of our political institutions.

It was also the year this voter became increasingly frustrated that our national media outlets — cable, network and legacy media — have self-bifurcated into stark pro- and anti-Trump factions.

Saritha Prabhu

Saritha Prabhu

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The real divisions, as I see it, aren’t between Democrats and Republicans, but between the political and corporate ruling class and the national media establishments that support them, on the one hand, and the rest of us. All the other divisions are less consequential.

Politicians from both parties have gotten away with letting down ordinary Americans for decades because millions of Americans are culturally wedded to their tribal political identities of Republican or Democrat, and can’t think outside the box.

Looked at this way, the election of Donald Trump made perfect sense to me. Sixty-three million voters — including millions of African-Americans, Hispanics and Democrats — rejected status quo politics and voted in a strong, rank outsider to shake the establishment from their comfortable perches.

Would Trump’s supporters have preferred a decent, moral, well-behaved, well-informed populist? Sure, but in dire times, you take the populist who shows up because beggars can’t be choosers, etc.

The Democratic Party and its followers have left me for many reasons, but here are a few examples.

The party and its followers have been showing illiberal tendencies for some time.

It has gone off the rails on immigration, free speech, identity politics and some other issues, a topic I’ll defer for another day.

I’m no Trump supporter, but I’ve been horrified and repulsed by the political and cultural left’s hatred, demonization and mistreatment toward President Trump, his family, his administration officials and his voters, which is even worse (if that’s possible) than what the right did to President Obama.

I view the current political climate both as a citizen and a writer.

As a citizen, I see myself more as a political orphan, neither Democrat or Republican.

For an opinion writer, self-identifying as a Democrat (or Republican) can be constricting.

It can consciously or unconsciously make you hew to positions, make you defend the indefensible. It can give you cognitive dissonance.

An example: Defending Hillary Clinton in 2016 and the Democratic Party’s current far-left stance on immigration would’ve required me to be dishonest about my views or to contort my opinions into impossible positions.

I see myself as a political independent these days, who’ll opine based on what she sees and thinks, not along party lines.

For what it’s worth, renegades like me are like that canary in the coal mine: We’re trying to warn Democrats where they’re tone-deaf or still don’t get it.

Saritha Prabhu of Clarksville is a USA TODAY NETWORK - Tennessee columnist. Reach her at sprabhu43@gmail.com.